President Javier Milei confirmed that in the middle of the year the Government will settle the debt with the Wholesale Electricity Market Administration Company (CAMMESA) from the “financial surplus” generated so far this year. And he admitted at the same time that the surplus was achieved by saving those payments.
In a radio interview, the president assured that “CAMMESA payments will be made in the middle of the year, in the month of June,” when referring to the debts that allowed the fiscal surplus to be consolidated, which were the central axis of the criticism outlined this Saturday by former president Cristina Fernández of Kirchner.
Milei explained that the payment will be able to be met since “throughout the first five months we are generating a lot of financial surplus to compensate for the CAMMESA items and the payment of bonuses.” And she admitted here that “when those numbers come, Operationally we are going to be in deficit, but with what we accumulated before, the accounts remain balanced.”
The Government had advanced to the Gas Producers and Electricity Generators, at the end of last week, a proposal to cancel the December 2023 and January 2024 transactions by delivering public securities for an approximate amount of 600 million nominal value. Furthermore, in the meeting led by the Minister of Economy, Luis Caputo, the operators were informed that, as of February, flows are being normalized.
From the economic portfolio they maintained that “by resolving the debts generated by the energy policy of the previous administration and the normalization of the flow, the National Government trusts that the sector can focus, with stability and predictability, on improving the service for the users.”
A millionaire debt
The State’s debt with electricity generators is already close to 1.3 billion dollars in the first quarter, while gas producers are owed another US$900 million, according to sector sources and reports sent to the Securities Commission.
In this way, the Executive Branch should cover with transfers the difference between the cost of energy generation and that actually paid by users, but it is not doing so. These shipments should be sent to the Wholesale Electricity Market Administration Company (Cammesa), the company that manages the wholesale electricity supply and with the gas producers, through subsidy programs such as the Gas Plan.
According to the consulting firm Economía y Energía, in the first quarter of the year the amount of subsidies accrued to these key sectors in the energy supply chain throughout the first quarter of 2024 was 71% less compared to the same period last year. .
“In the first quarter, subsidies were accrued to the energy sector for 666 million dollars, 71% less than in the same period of the previous year. The retraction of subsidies directed to the energy sector during the first quarter of 2024 led to an increase in the debt of the National State with electricity generators and natural gas producers, among others,” they stated from that consulting firm.
These obligations accumulate and put pressure on the fiscal accounts of the national State, which can swell the account. floating debt composed of late payments that consists of the difference between accrued expenses and those that are actually paid. This payment commitment, according to the president, will only be made in June.
